


How do we forgive ourselves for the things we never became

by Zalpal



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Book References, Chapter two, IT Chapter Two Spoilers, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Reddie, Repression, currently chapter two compliant, that might change
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-24
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-02-28 23:48:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23295748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zalpal/pseuds/Zalpal
Summary: "Dare he say, cute?  No.  Not cute.  He was someone that someone else would think was cute.  His assistant was objectively attractive, not cute. "There will be Reddie later I swear.  I’m a garbage writer so I’m only writing Eddie and Richie because I can’t write anything half decent for any of the other losers.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Myra Kaspbrak, Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Kudos: 5





	1. The show must go on

“I know your secret, your dirty dirty secret” The clown leaned forward, jaw unhinging, revealing rows upon rows of jagged teeth nested in writhing muscle. 

Richie shot up in bed, his sheets sticking to his body from the sweat. Hands shaking, he reached for the glass by his bed, watered down bourbon from the night before. The wrong glass to reach for, he should have reached for his glasses but a part of him was afraid that if he put them on he would see the clown in front of him. That the apparition from his dreams would become a reality, but nightmares are just in the mind. There’s nothing real about a nightmare. Having drained the glass he slipped back under the blankets, he could have sworn he heard laughing.

Morning brought blurry eyes and a pounding headache. The sunlight crept through the slits in the shutters. Despite being summer, the sunlight felt cold. He shivered. Groaning, wanting nothing more than to go back to sleep but being pulled out of bed half by the obligations lying before him in the day and half from a terror he couldn’t explain. A terror that scuttled across his soul like a roach, hiding in the dark corners of his mind. During the day he could forget about it but during the night the infestation spread. No amount of sleeping pills recklessly prescribed by his team of yes-men doctors or bourbon so top shelf you needed a step stool to pull it down could exterminate the fear, the nightmares. Sometimes, nightmares are just memories you’ve forgotten. 

Richie could never remember his nightmares though. He’d been an insomniac since he started college. He never finished school as his part time hobby as an open mic comedian sky rocketed him into a full time career of stardom. Who needs a degree when you make what an Ivy League education costs in a year? 

He shuffled out of bed, mismatched slippers on his feet. On his kitchen counter his assistant had left him a cup of coffee and a note saying he would be back in one hour so to not bolt the door shut and explicit instructions to not spike the coffee before the morning show appearance. He went to the fridge for his creamer of choice, Bailey’s, a compromise from the whiskey he would have preferred to use, and poured some into his coffee. He went to lock the top bolt of the door. To give himself the illusion of privacy. He had insisted on having at least one lock that his assistant didn’t have the key for. He knew he was being difficult, but that was all he knew how to be. After caffeine and some Advil he felt prepared to get ready to go to the morning show. His outfit was already carefully selected by his assistant, no goofy Hawaiian shirts, he hadn’t be allowed to wear those in years. They weren’t “on brand” whatever that meant. 

Richie’s phone buzzed incessantly, then the banging on the door started. “Richard Tozier, I swear if you don’t get your ass out here right now!” More banging. More buzzing. How his hyper neurotic assistant managed to call him, text him, bang on his door, and scream at him all at the same time always incited something between respect and fear in Richie. “I WILL drag you out! It wouldn’t be the first time!” 

Richie opened the door, finally putting the assistant out of his misery. He looked down at the short man. He might have been short but he was anything but small. Maybe his frame was small, but the endlessly seething anger made him seem taller than Richie’s 6ft3 frame. “We’re leaving. Right now.” Richie followed trying very hard to not shoot off at the mouth because today was not the day. He was one more bad joke from his assistant quitting on the spot. He liked this one. None of the others had lasted half as long. This one was determined, and dare he say, cute? No. Not cute. He was someone that someone else would think was cute. His assistant was objectively attractive, not cute. 

The short, brown haired man continued to rant about Richie being late (again), locking him out (again), ignoring his notes (again), not answering his calls (again), being unprepared (again), and being disrespectful (again). Richie finally cut him off “Look dude, I’m sorry ok?” 

“Don’t call me ‘dude’, my name is John.” The assistant snapped before softening his tone “I need you to be better Richard. I need you to be a professional.” He sounded exhausted and the twinge of guilt in Richie’s stomach crawled its way up his throat like a spider, leaving small burns of shame with each step. He reached with a shaking hand to his back pocket to remove a flask, quickly taking a swig to push the creature back down his throat, to drown it in his stomach. He didn’t get to the drowning part though as John snatched the flask from him half way through his drink, spilling some of the amber liquid on Richie’s shirt. “Rich, you can’t keep doing this.” He never called him “Rich”, only Richard or dumbass or pain-in-my-ass or paycheck. Something in the pet name called to a memory he couldn’t remember. Richie couldn’t look the man in the eyes. They finished the drive in silence. 

The morning show made him do his voices, his impressions. His greatest skill was pretending to be someone else. Sometimes he wondered what that said about him. Sometimes he knew what that said about him. The faster he jumped through the hoops the faster he could get home. He was always rushing to the next thing. 

Two nights later, Richie was getting ready for his performance. He loved the spotlight. He complained about the interviews and the fans and the morning shows but deep down he loved it. The approval made him feel like he was worth something. He wasn’t just a trashmouth; he was a comedian. He was someone who mattered. He desperately sought approval and received lots of it. Waiting for the show to start always made him nervous though. Despite having done countless performances just like this one the little voice inside of his head would always say “What if they don’t like you this time?” They always did. They always loved him. He didn’t need anything else, right? Adoration was enough, right? This is enough. 

His phone rang, pulling him out of his standard pre-show-existential-crisis-spiral. It was from Derry, Maine. His blood ran cold. Most people don’t like answering the phone at all and Richie was most people in that regard, but this was a strange number from a strange place he hadn’t been to in years. A place he’d thought he’d forgotten. A place he’d buried so deeply within himself that he hadn’t remembered forgetting. A promise, Richie didn’t keep promises often and made them even less often. This was an oath though. Richie was going back to Derry, Maine. The spider of guilt with spindly legs tipped with barbs of shame that he fought so hard to keep swallowed, to keep floating belly up at all times, deep within his own stomach came back to life with a vengeance. He never knew its name before but he did now, fear. It was alive again and racing up his throat dragging his breakfast, lunch, dinner, and liquor with it. He rushed out the side door to throw up over the railing. The set assistant ran out after him. He had to be on stage in one minute. Sixty seconds. The set assistant offered water but he took a bourbon and a mint. He had to get on stage. His hands were shaking. Fuck


	2. Crepes are Thursday Food

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eddie didn’t know what to do but say he was sorry. He said he was sorry a lot. He was really good at saying he was sorry. He was less good at being sorry.

Myra sobbed in the passenger seat. It was the quiet kind of sobbing that someone does when they can’t wail anymore, when all the air has been sucked out of their lungs. The kind of sobbing that sucks all of the air out of a room. Eddie looked at the road. He didn’t know what to say. A part of him was relieved at what the doctor said. He wouldn’t have to worry anymore, but Myra was devastated. He shouldn’t be relieved about anything that destroyed his wife. What kind of person is anything but distraught by his wife sobbing in the car next to him?

“We could always look into adoption, Marty?” He said trying to sound upbeat by the suggestion not because of the doctor’s results and normally she loved that pet name. He reached over to put his hand on his wife’s thigh. He didn’t have to reach far, she spilled over, filling the cup holders, almost reaching his seat. 

“I want a real kid; I don’t want to buy one.” She snapped at him, before apologizing and continuing her silent cry. Eddie didn’t know what to do but say he was sorry. He said he was sorry a lot. He was really good at saying he was sorry. He was less good at being sorry. 

He was objectively a good husband though, or at least he tried to be. He worked enough hours to provide for anything Myra could want. He bought her pretty things. He went to the doctors’ appointments she so kindly booked for her “Eddie-Bear”. He took his medication at the same time every single day. He was responsible.   
Once home he helped her out of the car and into their nice house. He didn’t have to get them this house. She would have been happy in their old tiny apartment. She honestly didn’t ask for much except for Eddie to be healthy. She cared about his health. He was delicate and she knew that. Eddie was all the more delicate because he sometimes suspected he was not delicate at all; Eddie needed to be protected from his own intimations of possible bravery.* She was a good wife. Eddie got her this beautiful house, large, a dream because he wanted to be a good husband. 

That night in they went to bed early, Eddie had an important meeting with a client the next day. They slept on opposite sides of their custom giant mattress, almost the size of a king and a twin pushed together. An ocean of decorative throw pillows with helpful phrases like “Live, Laugh, Love” stitched on, separated the two. Eddie turned on his side and smiled despite the guilt. Myra could not have children. He should be sad and a part of him was sad because he knew how badly she wanted them; like most things in their marriage, he didn’t have an opinion on the subject, it was easier that way. Now, there would be no reason for them to continue trying to have kids. It was the trying that bothered Eddie. He was free, at least a little bit. 

Mornings were all about routine. First, he got up to go on a run. Running cleared his head. It was funny, he had such horrible asthma but he ran three to five miles a day. He didn’t think about that though. That topic was folded and packed away neatly like the laundry he did for the two of them before being put into the box in his mind labeled “DO NOT OPEN”. The lid was getting a little harder to close. He ran harder, faster. As Myra got larger he seemed to get leaner, more muscled. He was small in frame but tight layers of muscles wound their way around his bones. It wasn’t that he was particularly invested in his aesthetics, but he was particularly invested in his routine. In the mornings he ran. In the evenings he went to the gym.

After his run he would shower quickly before making Myra breakfast. It was Thursday so crepes with seasonal fruit were on the menu. Crepes are Thursday food. Then it was time to get ready for work. After a few hours of work things would change though, because today was different. He had a meeting with a new client, an important client, some big shot architecture company. Eddie was the only person they trusted for the job, rightfully so. Eddie was good at his job. Eddie was actually great at his job. All of his quiet, soft-spoken mannerisms he adopted at home fell away the second he was on the clock. Eddie never stopped moving, he was full of anxious energy. He got work done faster than his other coworkers because he was nonstop. He was the energizer bunny with a coke habit. To say he was a hot head would be generous. To say he was a hyper-focused, motor-mouthed, argumentative, spit-fire would be more accurate. 

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. He drummed his fingers on his steering wheel as he swerved through the other drivers to get to the meeting early. To Eddie, early was on time and on time was late and late was unacceptable. His phone rang and he saw Myra’s number pop up on the screen on his dash board.  
Taptaptaptaptaptaptaptap. His fingers sped up as he answered her. She wasn’t supposed to call him at work. She often called him at work. She was worried about the roads being slick because it had rained three hours ago. Something in him made him argue. Something that he almost never did. He was a risk analysist for god’s sake, it was quite literally his job to judge whether something was worth the risk or not. He knew he could drive on the dry roads. 

“Okay. Goodbye.” He ended the argument cutting her off, hanging up. He let out a sigh of relief before the phone rang again. Myra.

“You didn’t say ‘okay goodbye I love you’ “ She prattled on, he was about to start arguing with her again when he saw he had a waiting call, a call from Derry, Maine. Eddie was emptied immediately. His soul ripping itself apart trying to desperately claw through his skin to escape. 

“Okay I gotta go now, I love you, Mommy”. She might have responded but he couldn’t hear her as he hung up and took the waiting call. Mike. Autopilot. Everything else inside of him was fleeing, fear wouldn’t even be the correct word to describe this. This was more than fear. The crash of metal into metal pulled him back together, catching the escaping pieces of himself and shoving them back inside like a kid grabbing stolen cookies and trying to hide them in his pockets. He had just run the red light. His car was wrecked. The other car smashed into him, T boning him, crumpling his passenger side door like paper.

“Eddie? Eddie? Are you okay?” Mike said on the other side of the phone.

“Yeah! I’m good!” Eddie answered quickly. What else was there to say?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *taking no credit for this, this sentence was all Stephen King’s doing but I think it fits here


End file.
